The Evolution of Islamic Extremism

Iraqi government forces celebrate while holding an Islamis Sate (IS) group flag after they claimed they have gained complete control of the Diyala province, northeast of Baghdad, on January 26, 2015 near the town of Muqdadiyah. Iraqi forces have "liberated" Diyala province from the Islamic State jihadist group, retaking all populated areas of the eastern region, a top army officer said today. The symbolic victory for Baghdad, which has at times struggled to push IS back, could clear the way for further advances against the jihadists . AFP PHOTO / YOUNIS AL-BAYATI (Photo credit should read YOUNIS AL-BAYATI/AFP/Getty Images)

On this week’s Political Scene podcast, the New Yorker staff writer Jon Lee Anderson joins host Dorothy Wickenden to talk about the current status of the war against Islamic radicalism. The two discuss the ways in which terrorism is expanding across the Middle East, the dystopian vision of the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS), and the limited impact of ISIS’s defeat in the Syrian town of Kobani. “Once again they have been stopped on the Turkish border, but they have found ways in which to appear to be important,” says Anderson. “In this rarefied media world that we live in, what gets more headlines: The fact that ISIS was pushed out of Kobani or this horrific hostage situation with the Japanese journalist and the Jordanian pilot?”

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